What Hides In Darkness (40K)

[The Necrontyr Messenger]

There are few things in the universe that can best a marine captain. Especially an angry one. And this particular one was running headlong through a mining complex with murder foremost in his mind. Crassiros wished to join his brethren immediately, but first, he had to catch up with them.

[White Haven]

Stunned into inaction by the half-sensed storm of forces swirling through the wide corridor, the black-armored Nemesis Marine stares first down the corridor towards the source of the energies. And then the great, gaping maw into the warp opens, nearly toppling the stunned figure into it before training and reflex can assert themselves. Even then, he's at best stumbling, grabbing for a half-crumpled girder to pull himself away from its maw. Only when the vortex starts to spin away into the warp again does the assault on his untrained senses ease....and his earlier confusion turns to rage at his own lackluster performance under this new kind of fire.

With a roar of anger that remains audible even over the screaming of his armor's jump-boosters, he takes to the air, hurtling forewards and upwards until he's near the ceiling. With a twist of both booster controls and his own mind, he flips on his back, slamming into the metal-clad ceiling on all fours and rebounding downwards towards the alien force. Neither pisol is in his hands; both are full of the haft of his halberd, and as his view steadies, he sees a group of figures fleeing the battle. Fleeing, while soldiers stay to fight. And the warp-storm has disappeared. Again, he twists in mid-air, turning his powerdive against the xenos front line to a madly-corkscrewing pursuit of the fleeing figures.

[Cynical Cat]

Grayson's flight was interrupted when something akin to an invisible hand plucked the marine out of mid flight and slammed him against a wall. Hard. And then tossed him into the next wall. Hard. And then let him slide to the ground.

The multiple impacts would have broken the bones of an ordinary human and left Grayson near three praetorians, two praetorian drones in front and one behind. The one behind him unleashed its plasma rifle. Three plasma bolts slammed into Grayson's jump pack, detonating the fuel in a blast that hammered the marine to the floor.

[GeneralTacticus]

At long last, the vortex shrank to a tiny point of unholy brilliance before vanishing with a faint, anticlimactic pop. A lingering aftertaste in the Warp and the devastation surrounding it gave mute testimony to its power. Their way no longer blocked, the Stormtroopers began moving up to support the Astartes.

With the vortex now finally dealt with, Halima could turn her attention to the Praetorians that were holding up the Astartes. Their implanted psi-jammers made using telepathy on them annoyingly difficult, and they seemed to lack the convenient suicide-switches of their lesser brethren, so that particular trick wasn’t going to work. No matter – she had others in her arsenal.

As Grayson’s abrupt and ignominious landing indicated that the Xenos psykers were still in the game – prompting Halima to strengthen her shields in readiness – invisible hands abruptly seized the weapons of the Praetorians menacing him, first spoiling their aim and then yanking them clean out of their hands and down the corridor towards the Imperial lines.

One of them smacked into the metal floor beside Brother Mal, motive force abruptly vanishing as it passed over the miscellaneous hunk of metal he was using for cover. Halima’s voice sounded in his commbead, sounding mildly amused, although a perceptive listener would have heard the falseness in it.

“Present for you, Tech-Captain. The Emperor delivers.â€

[SirNitram]

"In the Emperor's name, I consecrate you!" Mal roared as he snapped up the Xeno plasma weapon, levelling it at his foes. "Incinerate the enemeis of Mankind, and live the life of war you were forged for!"

It was a decidedly shortened version of a prayer the Tech-Priests used before working with Xeno weaponry. On the plus side, it culminated not with oils and mystic hand passes, but with a blast towards the drones.

[The Necrontyr Messenger]

Crassiros charged at the praetorians in silence. Actually, he didn't. He charged with the ringing of armoured feet on rails and solid ground, snout of his helmet, accompanied by gunmetal air hoses, down, crimson eyepieces glowing against the blackness of his armour. Devotional prayers and seals fluttered from his limbs and the armoured tubes that crossed his breastplate in an X shape flexed with each step. He jinked from side to side, and seized the closest of the enemy, powered fingers grasping firmly as he pushed Hamila's borrowed bolter into its face and fired, holding the trigger down for about six point blank shots, which punched at a relatively low speed into the creature's faceplate and exploded moments later, not blasting the head apart so much as breaking the faceplate up into fractured pieces. He elbowed it in the head, smashing pieces aside and caving in its - skull? Who knew?

A pall of smoke erupted as, to make sure, he crushed into the creature's chest inwards, breaking and burning through armour and corpse beneath. Another, different vapour trail of metals erupted as a plasma bolt dug into the plate that covered his groin, rare metals from the Great Crusade and blessed iron halo struggling with alien blasphemies, pain of conducted energy lanced through into the marine beneath, and he let out a roar of purification as he struggled to turn discomfort into resolve.

The Astartes had been fireproofing their oath papers and using thermo-setting plastics mixed with their ritual waxes for thousands of years, though, and all the impact did to the fluttering papers was burn a large hole in the wide oath of the moment that covered him like a loincloth there.

[Charon]

Vibius growled as the armor of these new creatures deflected some of his rounds. A few found niches, cracks, and blew off limbs. The rest hit and openned harmlessly on their armor. That hadn't worked as well as he'd hoped. Apparently the xeno had felt like giving the Astartes a workout, only fair to use what you are given. Vibius peaked out of cover as brother Grayson was struck down by a psyker and fell in the midst of the enemy. An Astartes would not fall while there were enemies to fight.

Vibius dropped his bolter, the strap once more catching it and carrying it behind him as the Space Marine launched himself forward. Bringing his storm shield up Vibius protected himself from many of the incoming shots as they hit his shield. Unlike his captain, Vibius was not silent in his charge. Turning his vox up almost all the way Vibius led his charge with the Omega Legion's warcry.

"Terra Victor!"

Vibius crashed into the forward most xeno that had surrounded brother Grayson. The xeno had been staring dumbly at it's recently lost weapon when it caught sight of the nine foot tall charging behemoth. It barely had time to catch anything other than that as the shield smashed into the creature and sent it flying through the air, armor cracked by the impact.

Vibius was barely slowed by the impact and as he came down upon the other two his hand reached back and in a flash drew forth his powersword, the blue tint already glowing as the sword came down on the second xeno, cleaving him from shoulder to sternum. Vibius turned to face the third xeno.

[The Necrontyr Messenger]

Time seemed to slow for Crassiros as he provided covering fire for Vibius. Contrary to how one might imagine from holovids and other fanciful depictions, covering fire tended, in reality, to be pretty well aimed - you couldn't suppress a trained enemy by conspicuously not shooting at him. A xenos raised its weapon and pointed it at him, he was staring down the barrel. His own arm drew a bead on the creature's eye, too, as he turned his head, and squeezed the trigger.

A twinned roar followed as both bolter and plasma gun fired at the same moment. The whickering field of his iron halo incandesced as the plasma impacted and a narrow jet passed through, even as most of it was deflected, some penetrated, gushing against his helmet in an explosion that obscured his head. With a clang, the hefty marine toppled backwards onto his eagle-headed backpack, onto a burgundy cloak he wore with it.

Coming to his senses after what could be no more than a few seconds, he realised that he couldn’t see through his right eye. Pain signals flared from it agonisingly, and he ignored them. He didn’t know if the bolt had penetrated his helmet and flared against his eyeball or simply flesh beside it. It didn’t matter. Either way, his vision in the right eye was gone, and the cirugeons aboard the black ship would fix it later, if he survived. He brought his head up. That last xeno hadn’t been so lucky, the bolt drilling through its eyepiece and exploding, sending pieces of shrapnel deep into its brain, it was having a spastic fit, either its senses were distorted, or its higher brain functions were damaged. Either way, the wretched thing was more of a danger, with its wild and uncontrolled movements, to its own compatriots than to the marines.

He had only one reaction to that.

Next!

[White Haven]

The fallen, battered figure of the former assault Marine lies limp on the floor...for a short while. Even the stunning impacts of psyker-power, inconveniently-placed walls, the floor, and plasma fire can't quite keep one of the Emperor's warriors down for long.

Brother Damon awakens to find his hand slamming down, glowing blue power-knife cradled in his grip as it spears through the foot of one of the alien warriors. His first conscious act is to twist it violently, then rip it back to him, leaving a ragged split in the xenos appendage. And then, delayed by several seconds, the cacaphony of battle descends on the Marine, whose armor would be blackened by the blast....were it not already black to begin with.

[The Necrontyr Messenger]

Salvor rose to his feet, and held his lightning claw in front of him. The Praetorians had died in quite some numbers now. Shots blazed around and against him, and he couldn't see to his right flank. Anger fuelled him, and he shot wildly at them, bolts skittering off carapaces. It wansn't his concern, though. The lightning claw cleaved through an enemy's weapon, dividing it into five segments with a burning flash of volitile components. The disruption field flicked off and the knives slid into the lightning claw. He punched, and used his other hand to fire the few remaining bolts in the clip at the enemy.

[Cynical Cat]

The surviving praetorians fall back, unleashing bursts of armour wrecking plasma fire at the Astartes to cover their retreat as they fall back to more defensible positions.

[Cynical Cat]

Hand Leader !Klilik lead his men to the breach, where the great mining operation of the humans had violated the outer layer of the vault. He ordered his men through, into the corridors of blue steel that waited inside. Two score soldier drones and four vanguard units would be enough to hold the breech for a while, especially since the wreck of the human tank would hinder efforts to bring more armour to bear.

He addressed his squad over the tac net. "Proceed to the warp gate. I will fulfill protocal and join you shortly."

[GeneralTacticus]

A long burst of plasma fire seared over Halima at head height, and she ducked into a convenient alcove, gritting her teeth in frustration. Further into the refinery, she could sense the great warp disturbance shifting and acquiring new patterns; without knowing what the disturbance was in the first place, she couldn’t begin to guess what it meant, but it couldn’t be good. And every second these things held them up was another second for it to get worse in.

This simply would not do. The Praetorians’ psi-jammers might make subtle telepathic tricks next to useless – but she had no need for subtlety here. Corposant lightning crackled over her psychic hood as she struck telepathically at the closest Praetorian. Brutal psychic fingers closed around its mind, to crush until nothing remained but an empty, useless husk. And when that was done, she would move on to the next, and the next.

Meanwhile, the Stormtroopers and survivors of Halima's retinue had arrived in support of the Deathwatch. Federov had shouldered his grenade launcher and was now employing his most prized possession - a master-crafted plasma gun, made in the forges of Ryza IV before that world's destruction. Beams of eye-searing brilliance lanced out at the Praetorians with chilling accuracy, though he was careful not to risk himself unduly - he could serve the Omnissiah far better as a researcher than as a corpse. Around him, hellguns blazed, seemingly feeble compared to his plasma gun but far more numerous, and the surviving heavy weapon teams were adding their fire as well.

[Cynical Cat]

Only a handful of praetorians survivied, but they inflicted a fearful toll. Their psi blockers made them quite resistant to any form of telepathic attack. Halima found even downing one that way quite exhausting. Carapace armour provided too little protection from their plasma rifles and storm troopers and heavy weapons teams died the moment they exposed themselves. Still, their casualties had been heavy. Only four remained and they leapfrogged back, two falling back as two provided lethal covering fire.

[The Necrontyr Messenger]

Crassiros pursued the praetorians as they cut down the unfortunate stormtroopers. One fell dead, with its head removed and cut into slices by his lightning claw, another he shot several times, and punched a third with the claw. His conversion field flared, and a bolt of plasma punched through it sideways, impacting his backpack, and by luck borne of shooting at him a lot, something gave. There was a flash of brilliant, blinding light and heat, intense enough to be felt, even through clothes, on the other side of the room. Though the power plant failed-off, it was quite destroyed. Fragments shot through the air like autocannon rounds, and a pall of smoke erupted from the space marine's back as he flew through the air, smacking into the wall with incredible force, flames blazing in the crater of his back for an instant, before moisture quenched them, preventing the few flammables inside the suit from burning further.

The Raven Guard dropped to the floor with a clang, and did not move.

[SirNitram]

Long flares of plasma fire erupted from Malkamar's position, as he shifted and moved. His agility was, of course, superhuman, and his ability to target opposition, even with the strange, alien weapon, was devastating. Where once he had been forced to unleash long blasts into a single drone, he blasted Praetorians one after the other as he danced between cover.

The Wraithbone wouldn't hold out much longer, though. It was never meant to absorb repeated plasma fire, and it was running as liquid in places, sloughing off. The Heretic Marine threw himself for cover, letting his weapon cool as he sought a moment's respite.

[Charon]

Vibius had kept pace with his captain as he tore into the enemy ranks, but had been slowly seperated from him by the Praetorian. He'd cut down the last of those near him when he picked up the explosion. The marine quickly turned, his sensors collecting all the information it could. The dreadnought xeno-creations had LoS on Crassiros, who was down for the moment.

Among the Omega Legion, there are often two schools of thought that are taught on how to approach such a situation. To the younger brother-warriors, they are told to lay down suppressive fire and push the enemy back. Needless heroics could very well cause the loss of more marines than are saved. A veteran is given different schooling.

With a mighty roar Vibius charged forward, bringing his storm shield up to almost completely cover him the black armored figure almost became a blur as it moved through the tunnel, jumping over the prone figure of Crassiros Vibius knelt down and dug his shield into the ground, grabbing all the purchase he could.

"Get him out of the field of fire!"

The vanguards saw the two marines and turned their heavy energy weapons to bare. Air was thrust aside of turned almost molten as four beams of energy were released Vibius braced himself as the beams seemed to almost instantly reach him. Onw of the beams dug into the ground to his right, digging deeply into the earth, creating a tunnel of glass that soon collapsed under the weight of the earth above it. Two other beams flew over his head where one tore into the beleagered ranks of troopers and another smashed into the ceiling above them, causing small chunks of rock to fall down on their ranks.

The fourth beam slammed directly into Vibius's storm shield, the force fields strained and screamed as they absorbed the energy or diverted it, Vibius himself was thrown back a number of feet from the impact. He could maybe take one more. Should the emperor smile upon him a third.

[GeneralTacticus]

As Crassiros and Vibius charged the surviving Praetorians, Halima reached out telekinetically and yanked away the weapons of those still fighting. The streams of plasma fire directed at the Imperial forces abruptly ceased.

As the Deathwatch and Stormtroopers moved in to finish the job, she steadied herself against the wall, vision swimming slightly at its edges. Mind-killing just one Praetorian had proven much harder than she’d expected, and she’d already burned a lot of energy on earlier targets. Gritting her teeth against a wave of nausea, she touched a control on her belt. A carefully-prepared cocktail of stimms washed through her veins and burned away fatigue – for now, at least. She’d pay for it in a few hours when they wore off and it all caught up with her, but one way or another, this should be over by then.

[GeneralTacticus]

The last Praetorian fell, and the Imperial forces moved over and past their position without pause. Behind them, medics moved among the fallen and tended to the wounded, but there was surprisingly little work for them; aside form the Astartes, most of those hit by the Xenos plasma weapons were beyond help.

As he passed one rather messily-dispatched Praetorian – lightning claw through the head from the look of it – Federov bent down slightly and retrieved the plasma rifle it had dropped. It would be interesting to observe its effectiveness the race that had made it, and its rate of fire was certainly impressive. These weapons would definitely bear further study.

Meanwhile, Halima sent psychic probes ahead into the main refinery, searching for further enemies and, in particular, for the Xenos psykers she’d encountered earlier.

[Cynical Cat]

Psyker activity was hard to gauge. There was none active nearby, but further away was obscured by the huge warp signature. Of course Halima had more urgent matters on her mind. The soldier drones and Vanguard units were firing volleys of pulse bolts towards the Imperials.

[SirNitram]

"Not quite as easy as I would have liked it." Mal murmured, letting fly a few times at the drones as his armour resolidifed. He ducked and scurried over over to Vibious and Crassius. He knelt down, inspecting the downed Astartes. "We will probably need some Apothecaries down here, unless we plan to retreat to orbit. I fear, if there is this much here, we will face much worse resistance deeper in."

[The Necrontyr Messenger]

PAIN.

Crassiros wasn't an Imperial Fist, and didn't much like pain. Well, not recieving it, at any rate. His head was banging steadily, and he could only see a bare glimmer of light. He considered for a moment if he had been blinded, but the lack of any response from his suit's numerous interfaces suggested otherwise.

He tried to speak. And failed.

Gathering his wits he considered how he felt.

Yes, pain was the overriding feeling, in truth. Head. Back. The head he could manage, but he couldn't feel his legs. He tried to move, but didn't make any headway. Then he considered. His suit had apparently lost power. The weight around his numb legs, and the gyro-locking mechanisms built into the archaic power armour, would prevent him from moving anyway.

"Some... Somebody get me out of this!" he shouted, loud, to be head through the helmet with the vox off. Of course, he'd forgotten that the vox bead he was wearing was independantly powered, and thus it came over the non-marines' radios particularly loudly...

[Charon]

Vibius glanced past his shield, at the vanguard units, they were getting ready to fire again, and more were deciding to aim at the cluster of stationary Astartes.

"Those psykers are still down there, and with our assault marine's pack broken, Crassiros down for the moment, and my shield almost blown, 300 meters is a suicide charge. Let the troopers do their duty to the empire while we regroup. For now we need to get out of the line of fire. Get the brother-captain out of here."

[The Necrontyr Messenger]

Slightly more annoying than being stuck in de-powered armour is being carried aroud in de-powered armour. "Lascannons and frag-rockets. See if they have either..." Crassiros suggested.

[Cynical Cat]

"Brother-Captain," crackled Crassiros's vox crackled, "this is Hereditary Colonel Maclon Venerex of the Senada Dragoons. We are advancing to support your position and our heavy weapon teams have both lascannons and frag missles. We were informed that frag weapons were ineffective against the xenos and currently have krak missles loaded.. We are at your disposal."